Crime and Arrests:  Deterrence or Resource Reallocation?

Garrett, Thomas A.; Ott, Lesli S.

doi:10.20955/wp.2010.011

Cited by 2 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 8 publications

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“…The authors also tested whether arrests reduced later crime levels, based on a deterrence hypothesis. Results from their ordinary least squares regression offered weak support that arrests reduced crime, but much stronger support for a resource reallocation hypothesis (Garrett and Ott, 2011).…”

Section: Policing Firearm Violencementioning

confidence: 97%

“…The relationship between crime and arrests normally assumes that earlier arrests deter later crimes. Conversely, there is a logical reason to believe that a positive association exists between the level of crime and number of arrests (Garrett and Ott, 2011;Jacob and Rich, 1980;Kohfeld, 1983;Kohfeld and Sprague, 1990). Decker and Kohfeld (1985) stated that police "undoubtedly responds to criminal behavior, and one therefore ought to expect that when the number of crimes increases, so do the number of arrests" (p. 439).…”

Section: Review Of the Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Lastly, there appears to be a dearth of more recent research that has explicitly examined if arrests are the result of increases in crime despite the acknowledgement that examinations of arrest and crime levels are complex due to reciprocal causality concerns (Decker and Kohfeld, 1985;Eck and Maguire, 2000;Jacob and Rich, 1980). One exception, Garrett and Ott (2011) used monthly time-series data from 20 large 72 PIJPSM 37,1 cities in the USA to examine arrests following increases in crime likely due to the reallocation of resources by police. The authors also tested whether arrests reduced later crime levels, based on a deterrence hypothesis.…”

Section: Policing Firearm Violencementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Therefore, the behavior of police in response to crime is a genuine concern to the public. Although work has documented the potential role that response time to calls for service plays on crime (Cordner et al, 1983;Spelman and Brown, 1984) and others have estimated the effects of changing levels of crime on police behavior (Decker and Kohfeld, 1985;Garrett and Ott, 2011;Kohfeld, 1983;Kohfeld and Sprague, 1990), less is known about how police respond to violent incidents in time and space.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

Policing firearm violence

Wyant

2014

Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies &Amp; Management

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Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to generate information about the contours of police responsiveness, focussing on how quickly and precisely police make firearm arrests after a shooting incident. Design/methodology/approach – Using a modified version of the Knox close pair method, a spatio-temporal clustering technique, over 11,000 shooting incidents and firearm arrests between 2004 and 2007 in Philadelphia, PA were analyzed. Findings – Police are responding quickly and in a geographically targeted fashion to shootings. Across Philadelphia elevated patterns of firearm arrests were approximately two and a half times greater than would be expected if shootings and firearm arrests lacked a spatio-temporal association. Greater than expected patterns of firearm arrests persisted for roughly one-fourth of a mile and for about one week from the shooting incident but the strength of these associations waned over space and time. The pattern of police response varied slightly across different police divisions. Research limitations/implications – The current method uncovered spatio-temporal patterning and determined when these patterns were significantly different from what would be expected if the events were completely independent. Specific events and processes surrounding each event are not known. Practical implications – Findings can help inform the knowledge about police behavior in terms of how police produce arrests. Originality/value – The patterns observed here provide more micro-level detail than has been revealed in previous studies regarding police responsiveness to firearm violence while also introducing a more integrated spatially and temporally specific framework.

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Section: Policing Firearm Violencementioning

confidence: 97%

Section: Review Of the Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Policing Firearm Violencementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Policing firearm violence

Wyant

2014

Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies &Amp; Management

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show abstract

“…The rational choice model also predicts that a higher number of police will reduce crimes, either because a greater police presence makes criminal activities less attractive or because more officers on the beat will apprehend more criminals (Garrett and Ott 2011; Tella and Schargrodsky 2004). In this study, the numbers of police in each Mexican state for the sample period are not available.…”

Section: Labor Market Deterrence and Control Variablesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessing the Impacts of Labor Market and Deterrence Variables on Crime Rates in Mexico

Liu

Fullerton

Ashby

2012

Contemporary Economic Policy

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Many studies examine the relationship between crime rates and various economic and/or sociodemographic variables in high income countries, but similar efforts for middle and low income countries are less common. Utilizing an 8‐year panel data sample for all 32 states in Mexico, this study assesses the impact of Mexican labor market and deterrence variables on various Mexican crime rates. The principal results indicate that: (1) State gross domestic product (GDP) per capita has ambiguous effect on crime rates under different conditions. Both wages and unemployment rates are negatively linked with crime rates. (2) Although the Mexican judicial and public security systems are widely believed to be ineffective, increased federal police forces and incarceration rates are associated with lower crime rates, but higher public security expenditure per capita is associated with higher crime rates. (3) The impacts from labor market and deterrence variables presented in (1) and (2) continue to hold under the Fox administration as well as for non‐border states. Their respective impacts diminish, however, under the Calderon administration as well as for border states because of the small number of observations. Overall, the results indicate that increasing average wages, federal police forces, and incarceration rates would have significant impacts on reducing crime rates in Mexican states. (JEL O54, K42)

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Crime and Arrests: Deterrence or Resource Reallocation?

Cited by 2 publications

References 8 publications

Policing firearm violence

Policing firearm violence

Assessing the Impacts of Labor Market and Deterrence Variables on Crime Rates in Mexico

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